


Memories of Memories

by AvengersCompound (emilyevanston)



Category: Captain America (Movies), Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Winter Soldier (Comics)
Genre: Anxiety, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fluff, M/M, Memories, Mild Language, Past, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovered Memories, WinterHawk Bingo, mentions of other(s) - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:34:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23104057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emilyevanston/pseuds/AvengersCompound
Summary: Clint goes through a box of Bucky’s old things that Steve has dropped off from the Smithsonian.  Bucky has ore trouble with the faded memories than he thought he would.Square filled:@winterhawkbingo- B5 Howling Commandos
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton
Comments: 7
Kudos: 77
Collections: Winterhawk Bingo





	Memories of Memories

Steve had passed on the box from the Smithsonian earlier that day. It was an ongoing struggle that Steve had with the museum. The stuff they had belonged to Bucky and Steve, but they saw it as history that they should get to display and share with the world. So there had been a continuous back and forth where the museum might send a small box of things they deemed of no value and Steve would speak to his lawyers who would send the museum demands and they’d beg him to let them keep some things and he’d tell them it was up to him to decide what they got to keep because it was his stuff.

This had been a box of ‘leftovers’ and while a lot of it had been Steve’s there was some stuff that belonged to Bucky, and Steve had thought maybe Bucky might like the rest because it was things that involved both of them. Photos of them as children, and some of their books and records from the apartment they’d both shared.

Clint had been sitting on the floor pawing through it ever since. Bucky felt slightly disconnected to everything really. He wanted to feel a connection to his past and be as sure he wanted his things back as Steve was. But when he looked through it, it was like he was looking through the things that belonged to a person he’d heard stories about and not him. Steve would give him these photos or trinkets and hope there would be some grand reveal and his old Bucky would be standing there, but it never happened. That old Bucky was gone and to be fair, so was that old Steve.

Still, Clint had been sitting on the floor going through it all since Steve had dropped it off, and the look of delight he had with every new treasure he pulled from the box was worth having it. Bucky lay on the couch while Clint leaned up against it sitting with his legs splayed out on either side of the box.

“Oh my god! Look at you and Steve. You were so cute!” Clint said holding a photo of what must have been both of them at around eleven or twelve years old. Bucky was towering over Steve who was much closer to the little girl who was just poking her head out from behind Bucky. “I always forget you were once heaps bigger than Steve.”

“Yeah, well serum,” Bucky said. “I vaguely remember being shocked when I first saw him. Like I was having some kind of torture hallucination.”

Clint leaned back and pecked Bucky’s cheek. “Who’s the little girl?”

“My sister,” Bucky said automatically though as soon as the word left his mouth it shocked him. He hadn’t thought about his siblings at all in at least fifty years. “Rebecca.”

“I didn’t know you had a sister. Did you call her Becky? Were you Becky and Bucky?” Clint babbled. “Hey, maybe she’s still alive. Or maybe she had kids? Maybe you’re an uncle?”

“Yeah,” Bucky said slowly. Not even sure what to do with that information. “Maybe.”

Clint was already pulling another photo out of the box. This one of him in military uniform with a group of other soldiers, including Steve and a woman. “Who are these guys?”

“You didn’t learn anything about me or Steve at all before you met us? Aren’t you supposed to be a spy?” Bucky teased.

“Well,” Clint said slowly. “To be fair, I met Steve straight of being mind-controlled. So I don’t think it’s fair to expect me to have done research while being mind-controlled. But also, I kinda like to make judgment calls without the person’s past getting in the way.”

Bucky smiled softly and nuzzled at Clint’s cheek. “God, I love you.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Clint grumbled. “Get off me.”

Bucky chuckled and lay back on the couch, returning to his previous state of absentmindedly running his fingers through Clint’s hair.

“So who are they?” Clint asked.

Bucky looked at the photo and began to point to people. “Well, that’s Steve,” Bucky said.

“Uh, duh,” Clint teased. “And here I was thinking it was me and I’d time-traveled back to 1943.”

Bucky pinched him before pointing at the women. “That’s Peggy Carter. She and Steve were sweet on each other. She started what you know as SHIELD with Tony’s dad.” Bucky knew most of that because he studied it while he was on the run. He could remember Peggy pretty clearly. Howard, he only associated with two memories. One was a flying car that didn’t fly and one was the soldier choking him to death. All the rest was in the mountains of research he did when he was trying to unlock the memories of who he was and what had happened to him.

He moved his finger between the men. “That’s Dum Dum.”

“Dum Dum?” Clint said. “Seriously?”

“I mean it’s not his real name. But… I can’t remember…”

Clint reached back and stroked Bucky’s jaw. “It’s okay,” he reassured him. “The others?”

“Jim, James, Jaques, and Gabe,” Bucky said moving his finger from one person to the next. Once again the names came easily but he wasn’t sure if it was because he’d studied or he genuinely remembered. He definitely remembered some of it. How he trusted them. Joking together. The smell of blood.

“Three Jameses and a Jaques? Maybe that Dum Dum’s name was James too,” Clint suggested.

Bucky furrowed his brow trying to remember. “Maybe. I don’t think so.”

“Did you have a thing with any of them?” Clint asked, leaning his head back and looking up at Bucky.

Bucky furrowed his brow. “Uhh…”

“Oh my god!” Clint said spinning around and putting his hands on Bucky’s chest. “You did, didn’t you? Which one?”

“Umm… I don’t think I did. But I might have wanted to. With Gabe,” Bucky answered. “Sorry, those memories feel like dreams to me so it’s hard to remember what actually was a dream.”

“Ohhh…” Clint teased, sitting back down and rifling through the box again. “Bucky and Gabe sittin’ in a tree…”

Bucky clocked Clint on the back of his head playfully and Clint started laughing.

“Oh hey,” Clint said pulling a chain out of the box. “Your dog tags.”

Bucky sat up and took them in his hand. “What? How? They should have been lost. I was MIA.”

“Were you? I thought you were KIA?” Clint asked. “I mean… not… you know what I mean.”

“I thought you didn’t look me up?” Bucky scowled.

“I didn’t!” Clint answered defensively. “But Steve was looking for you. I knew some things.”

“Did they look for me?” Bucky asked. Anxiety bubbled up inside him. He was sure these had been lost and rather than thinking they had found him, he kept thinking that when HYDRA infiltrated SHIELD they gave his shit to the Smithsonian for the Cap exhibit and no one had questioned what that had actually meant. That if one person had used their fucking brain for one second maybe they could have got him out of there. “What did they find? Just these and my arm? I swear I had them…”

Clint moved up on the couch and cradled his jaw, getting Bucky to look him in the eyes. “Buck,” he said firmly. “You’re here now. We can’t change the past.”

Bucky gave a small nod and let out a breath.

“Why don’t you tell me what everything means?” Clint asked.

It was one of the centering techniques they’d both been working on. Describe something in detail that was real and you couldn’t spiral into the what-ifs.

“R. Barnes is Rebecca,” Bucky said pointing to the name engraved into the rusted metal. “Do you think she got these?”

“Buck, don’t,” Clint said softly. “Her address is in Indiana? I thought you were living in Brooklyn with Steve.”

“Yeah, we moved to Brooklyn when I was a kid, but my Granny fell ill and they went back. I was already rooming with Steve when that happened,” Bucky explained. He furrowed his brow trying not to focus on the fact that if this had been returned to Rebecca she’d have been told all they’d found was his arm.

“What’s the P for?” Clint asked.

“Oh,” Bucky said. “Protestant. That’s where your religion goes in case you need last rights or something.”

He ran his thumb up to the serial number. “That’s my serial number. The O is my blood type. And this bit, T41 42. That’s about my tetanus shot. 41 is the year. I’ve got no clue what the 42 is. Medical shit. And this 2 means I’m from New York.” He explained as he moved his fingers over the numbers in reverse order. “That first number means I was drafted.”

“Yeah? I always thought you musta enlisted. Like Steve,” Clint said and his hand went up into Bucky’s hair. Bucky closed his eyes and enjoyed the dull tingle at the base of his skull that buzzed as Clint’s fingers moved over his scalp.

“Nah, not me. I could have been quite content to stay at home,” Bucky said with a shrug.

“Then you wouldn’t have met me,” Clint pouted.

Bucky chuckled, and pushed Clint back into the couch and lay down on top of him. “Well, I guess it was some kinda fucked up destiny,” Bucky said and put the chain over Clint’s head.

“You’re giving them to me?” Clint asked.

“They’re supposed to go home when I’m done,” Bucky said. “And here I am.”

“Oh my god,” Clint said breaking down into what could only be described as giggles. “That’s the sappiest futzing thing you’ve ever said to me.”

Bucky chuckled and wrapped the chain around his fist, pulling Clint into a kiss.


End file.
